In November, the Minister of Education, Youth and Sports Mikuláš Bek and the Minister of Science, Research and Innovation Helena Langšádlová presented their awards to a total of 21 winners in five categories.
Awards in the category of outstanding university educational activities are given to university staff for outstanding educational activity or significant innovation in teaching over the past three years. The aim of the award is to emphasise the importance and relevance of good teaching in universities, to recognise the outstanding work of university teachers, and to highlight best practice and significant innovation in this area.
The award went to Markéta Košatková from the Faculty of Education, who has been working for a long time to transform the educational environment by supporting students at Masaryk University not only in academic excellence but also in personal and social development. She emphasises the international dimension of education, teaching in international teams, a culturally sensitive approach and extracurricular volunteering. Structural inequalities in education are an important pillar of her pedagogical work, which she and her students address by working with socially disadvantaged families.
“Being appreciated for teaching is quite rare in the university environment. We know how to assess the output of scholarship, publications and projects, but teaching itself is often on the periphery of our interest. I am delighted to receive this award because teaching is an important part of my job. I enjoy looking for innovations and thinking about what I can do to teach my students better,” said Markéta Košatková, who is currently focusing on supporting future teachers through virtual reality teaching, which allows them to practice teaching skills in a safe environment and with an emphasis on the reflective component of education. “My other projects involve learner wellbeing and research into situations that can cause secondary trauma to people working with young people. However, my priority is still to support socially disadvantaged children and their often complicated educational pathways, as I believe the university has a huge potential to fulfil an important role in society,” said Košatková, who is an assistant professor at the Faculty's Department of Social Education.
In the category of outstanding students and graduates and exceptional student achievements, Martin Toul from the Faculty of Science was one of the ten recipients from across the Czech Republic. This year, he completed his doctoral studies in molecular and cell biology and genetics.
Martin Toul has worked as a researcher in the Protein Engineering team at RECETOX’s Loschmidt Laboratories. Together with Martin Marek, they have described an innovative and sustainable way to produce light – they have elucidated the hitherto mysterious luciferase lighting mechanism found in sea pansy (Renilla reniformis). Their findings were published this year in the prestigious scientific journal Nature Catalysis.
Martin Toul is the holder of two MU Rector’s Awards for the best students in both Master’s and doctoral programmes and the winner of the Brno PhD Talent Award. In 2020, he won a Fulbright Postdoctoral Scholarship for doctoral students, which enabled him to spend a semester at the University of Texas at Austin. He completed the MU Mendel Doctorandus programme and defended his European doctoral thesis. After his PhD, he joined the VIB research institute in Ghent, Belgium. In his spare time, he enjoys snowboarding and ballroom dancing.